


Off the Grid

by Misty_Floros



Series: The Various Adventures, Joys and Sorrows of Ms Aziraphale & Ms Crowley [9]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexual Relationship, F/F, Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, Ineffable Wives | Female Aziraphale/Female Crowley (Good Omens), Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:35:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28342494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Misty_Floros/pseuds/Misty_Floros
Summary: After the Apocalypse doesn't happen, Hell cuts Crowley off from their power source.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: The Various Adventures, Joys and Sorrows of Ms Aziraphale & Ms Crowley [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2197425
Comments: 2
Kudos: 52





	Off the Grid

**Author's Note:**

> CW: character close to death (but no actual death), nausea

She felt weak, so weak. The floor made for an uncomfortable bed, but she wouldn’t be able to get up even if she tried. Which she wasn’t inclined to do, seeing as the room spun around her nauseatingly even in her supine position.

She tried to deepen her breathing in order to get enough oxygen into her bloodstream to keep the body going, but she managed merely shallow gasps. In any case, there was no way it would suffice even if she succeeded. The corporation was over six millennia old; there was no chance it would continue functioning.

She still possessed a remnant of the latent energy incorporated into her upon creation, and it was the only thing keeping her conscious. Aeons ago, when she’d been cut off from the blazing hearth that was God, this fragment had kept her cruelly alive for a time before Lucifer and his associates had constructed another power source. It had almost gone out that time, and what remained now consisted of little more than glowing embers.

She blacked out and then blinked her eyes open again, the peeling walls of her bedroom blurry around her. Feeling she was going to be sick, she turned on her side and retched and coughed, but nothing came out. Of course not. She didn’t exactly bother with the digestive tract whenever she ate anything.

Well, at least she wouldn’t die in a puddle of her own vomit. That would be beyond undignified. Still, this wasn’t how she’d wanted to go. Originally, she’d thought she’d die during the Apocalyptic battle. She hadn’t planned on joining in, of course – she’d go into hiding until someone inevitably found her, she’d fight for her life and perish quasi-heroically. With the Apocalypse called off, she’d have thought she’d die in the next one, and Aziraphale would be there, they’d fight back to back like in all those delightfully over-the-top action films, and –

“Crowley?” someone shouted, Aziraphale, of course. Her dear angel, well, Crowley did want to see her, her presence was a comfort. Aziraphale had seen her in a horrible state more than once already, this would hardly faze her. Would she die in Aziraphale’s arms? The demon had always hated tragedies. Too much bad in the world already, no need to pretend there was more.

“I felt something,” Aziraphale said, voice frantic. Her steps seemed to approach, but Crowley wasn’t sure. Her senses weren’t performing very reliably. “What’s wrong? You look horrible, Crowley, oh, what’s happened to you?”

Crowley’s hands were being held, she thought. She tried to squeeze the angel’s hands back, but the energy necessary for that evaporated as it travelled down the tendons in her forearms.

“There’s no…” Aziraphale began, voice high-pitched. Crowley tried very hard to stay awake.

 _Hell cut me off_ , she tried to say, but when she opened her mouth, only a quiet moan came out. She let her eyes slide shut, frustrated and exhausted.

“Shhh. It’s all right,” Aziraphale said. She didn’t sound like it was all right. “I think I understand what happened.”

Crowley thought she could smell Aziraphale’s perfume. It was that subtle floral smell the angel had taken a liking to recently. Colognes and perfumes were the only thing Aziraphale switched up often enough that you could use the word “frequently” if you were feeling generous.

Crowley was about to vanish from existence, and she was thinking about Aziraphale’s perfume. Look what’s become of me, she thought to no one in particular. But that scent is so nice, she reflected deliriously, you can hardly blame me, I’d wrap myself in it if I could.

She lost and regained consciousness in short flashes. She didn’t know if she was awake, dreaming, dead or alive. She felt as if she were suffocating, unable to breathe properly.

She registered that her palm was touching something flat and wonderfully warm. Her limp arm was being held up, she realised. With difficulty, she squinted up and saw Aziraphale leaning over her, pressing Crowley’s hand to her chest, above her breasts. Crowley felt a spark in her core, and she’d felt that sort of thing before, the time she and all the other demons had hooked their essences up to the strange grey sphere that looked like a star from a scrapyard. Crowley had never known what it actually was – Lucifer had locked it up in the dungeon of his palace in Pandaemonium and hadn’t seemed inclined to share any information. Of course he hadn’t. Hell forbid if a demon figured out how to make their own and become independent.

She was being connected to a new power source.

 _What the fuck are you doing?_ she wanted to yell. Fuck, fuck, no, if Aziraphale was doing what Crowley thought she was doing, and really, what else could it be, it was an awful idea, one Principality couldn’t possibly sustain both herself and a demon. And they’d be irrevocably dependent on each other, this wasn’t fair to Aziraphale, and it was a supremely shite idea in the first place –

It felt like a shock from a defibrillator, not that Crowley had ever experienced that, but some humans were awfully fond of hospital dramas, and those seemed to abide by the rule that the more incorrectly used defibrillators, the merrier.

She took in one lungful of air after another, finally able to breathe deeply. She opened her eyes, not remembering when she’d shut them.

Aziraphale was clutching her hand between both of hers now, and her face was pallid.

“Has it worked?” the angel rasped.

Crowley stared at her, trying to muster the energy to talk. To her surprise and horror, she succeeded. “You stupid blessed –” she wheezed in a thready voice. Her heart was racing. “What were you…”

The angel slumped from her seated position to lie down on her side on the dusty floor. Her body landed on chunks of plaster, but she didn’t seem to mind. She still hadn’t relinquished her hold on Crowley’s hand.

“Crowley, tell me it worked, please,” Aziraphale pleaded, blinking languidly as if it drained her to keep her eyes open.

“Yes, apparently it did,” Crowley whispered. The power she was connected to felt like one she’d possessed an eternity ago herself. God had had access to the energy of an infinity of stars, and had granted her a negligible piece of it, so that in comparison, Crowley’d had the power of a minuscule fusion reactor. Now Aziraphale had handed her half of her own negligible piece.

Aziraphale closed her eyes and smiled. “We should rest now.”

Crowley swallowed her panic. “Let’s at least move to bed, angel.”

“I don’t think you currently have one,” Aziraphale said with a tiny nod towards the empty space where a bed had been. Only the pillows had remained, lying sadly by the remains of the wall. They’d been the only part of the bed she’d bought; she conjured the rest from thin air whenever she felt like it should be there. She’d known she should have made it permanent.

“Ugh, I’ve forgotten how much of this place is held together by miracles,” Crowley groaned. “I don’t suppose we can magic ourselves a new bed.”

“I’d refrain from any miracles for a while,” Aziraphale said. “Better not tempt fate.”

“Fate isn’t a thing you can tempt, I don’t think,” Crowley said. Now that she had the juice to move her limbs again, she intended to put them to good use. She wrapped her arms around Aziraphale, relishing the warmth the angel radiated. “And I’ve been in the tempting business for a good long while, me.”

Her chest felt tight, and this time it wasn’t from a lack of energy. What she had at her disposal now equaled barely half the power she’d been used to having, but it still sufficed to keep her alive and well, and with some rest, hopefully to produce a miracle or two. She could sense that Aziraphale had kept about the same amount for herself, perhaps a little less.

She sighed, squeezing her eyes shut. “Stupid, foolish piece of celestial self-sacrificing…” she started, not quite sure how to finish the sentiment.

“Let’s rest and then we can talk,” Aziraphale mumbled weakly.

They lay together on the floorboards among the chunks of plaster. Crowley didn’t dare doze off, keeping an eye on Aziraphale’s fluctuating magic. Every time it seemed to diminish, Crowley’s heart began drumming out a panicked rhythm.

After a few hours, Aziraphale opened her eyes and slowly sat up.

“Are you feeling better?” Crowley asked anxiously.

“Me?” Aziraphale raised a quizzical eyebrow as if she didn’t understand why Crowley was even asking. “Of course. I’m fine. Are you?”

Crowley stared at her incredulously, unable to piece together a response. The angel acted as if it was par for the course, giving up half her bloody divine energy. Oh yes, Crowley, here you go, no, don’t worry about it at all my dear, completely tickety-boo.

Crowley pushed herself to a kneeling position and squeezed Aziraphale in a tight embrace. She found herself unable to speak, tears flooding her eyes. Aziraphale rubbed her back soothingly.

“I couldn’t not do it,” the angel said. “Do you understand? I couldn’t… Living in a world without you, it would be…” she trailed off, voice choked up. She pressed Crowley’s body close to her own. “It doesn’t bear thinking about,” she whispered, pressing her face into the demon’s neck. “Why didn’t you tell me they could do this? Crowley, if I hadn’t come in time, if I hadn’t felt it, you –”

“But you did come in time. And we’re both here now,” Crowley attempted to soothe.

Aziraphale was shaking. “Crowley, you…”

“It’s okay,” Crowley said, pressing a firm kiss to Aziraphale’s cheek. Then to her forehead. To her temple. “It’s okay now. You saved me. It was a terrible plan, angel, fucking idiotic, but it worked.”

For a while, they just held each other, tearful, relieved, afraid. “We’ll have to be more careful from now on,” Aziraphale said, voice wobbly, when she managed to speak past the lump in her throat. “We have much less power than before. We’ll need to choose a hideout, put up wards, that sort of thing.”

“We will,” Crowley agreed.

Aziraphale released Crowley and scrambled up. She held both hands out to help her stand as well. “Let’s go to mine,” the angel suggested. “I don’t think this place is very soothing for the nerves at the moment.”

“Yeah, good idea,” Crowley said.

They walked through the now reality-abiding and much smaller flat, Aziraphale’s hand clutching Crowley’s in a grip that was just a tad too tight and desperate.

“How do you…” Crowley began, unsure, her gaze directed at the floor. “How do you even repay someone for something like this, angel?”

Aziraphale stopped, looking at her. “Are you really asking that? Don’t you get it?”

“Get what? Do you realise how deep in your debt I am right now? I literally owe you my God-damned life.”

Aziraphale sighed, as if Crowley’s words annoyed her beyond belief. “Stop spouting this nonsense, dear. I rather thought we were past that. This isn’t about debt.”

“I guess,” Crowley conceded. “I just don’t know how I can accept this, this sacrifice.” Her eyes searched Aziraphale’s face as if looking for a solution to her sudden unbearable guilt.

Aziraphale rolled her eyes. “Sacrifice? What do you think I am, a martyr? I tell you, dear, this entire thing was completely selfish. Think about my motives for a second. Why do you think I did it?”

“Because you…” Crowley started slowly.

“Because I love you, yes. So, _I_ would be devastated if– if something happened to you. _I_ would be beyond miserable, and it would make _my_ entire existence much, much worse. You see? It’s completely about me. Wholly egoistic.”

Crowley looked shell-shocked. Which was understandable, really, Aziraphale had thrown all that at her as if it were a matter of course, when that wasn’t quite the case. She hadn’t voiced all of that before so bluntly. Well, nothing like a near-death experience to uncork unsaid emotions, she supposed.

She felt her cheeks heat up as she replayed what she’d said. “Well, let’s get a move on. I’m in a dire need of a nice cup of cocoa.”

“Uh, yeah. Of course. Yah,” Crowley said.

Aziraphale dimpled at her. Crowley felt her heart do a weird thing which she absolutely wasn’t calling “skipping a beat”. _Might need that defibrillator after all_ , she mused.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.


End file.
